


Maturity

by JaneTurenne



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-01
Updated: 2011-05-01
Packaged: 2017-10-18 21:09:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/193330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneTurenne/pseuds/JaneTurenne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor learns, to his dismay, that carrying young companions comes with complications.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maturity

**Author's Note:**

> Beta thanks to rabidsamfan

The Doctor wandered through the corridors of the TARDIS, whistling a jaunty tune, stopping for a moment before a convenient mirror to straighten his jumper and arrange the loose strands of his blond hair in _precisely_ the right pattern of floppiness. "Oh to be in England, now that April's there," he murmured offhandedly, admiring the effect of his pilary attentions. "Well, not actually in England. And not actually April. Well, I suppose it's as much April in the Vortex as it is any other time. It's all the Aprils all at once, in fact. A super-April. _The_ super-April. But 'Oh to be in the Vortex, now the super-April's there, as always' just doesn't have quite the same ring. Nice fellow, Browning. Smoked like a chimney, though. And had the most despicable father-in-law. I remember once, he said to me..."

The Doctor glanced left, then right, then spun nimbly around to glance behind, only to realize that his scintillating little monologue was lacking for an audience. "Well, of all the cheek," he commented to the world at large. "Three young people scampering about the place, always underfoot at the least convenient times, and not one can manage to be about when you've a reminiscence about Browning needs listening to. _Really_." He patted the TARDIS's wall, in a gesture of thanks for _her_ constant presence, and set off down a likely-looking corridor.

"I do like having children about the place, though," he continued, this time addressing himself to his ship. "Such a refreshing presence. None of the complications of adulthood, just a sense of wonder, and an appreciation for adventure. Really, I think from now on I may just..."

The Doctor opened the door into the main laboratory, a likely enough place to find Adric and Nyssa, his young mathematical and scientific-minded companions. And find them he did--in an impossible-looking horizontal tangle of Trakenite and Alzarian limbs, stretched out on an old sofa relocated in service of the occasional mid-experiment nap, with their tongues most emphatically installed in each other's mouths.

"Aaaannngghhhh!" screeched the Doctor. "I...blarngh!"

Nyssa sat up, not nearly so abruptly as the Doctor would have expected, her mouth unsealing from Adric's with an unattractive wet smack. "Hello, Doctor," she said, with remarkable composure considering the location of Adric's hands, and the fact that he was still lying pinned beneath her. "I'm sorry, did you want to use the lab? We can..."

"You!" gasped the Doctor. "You...well, you!"

By now Adric was sitting too, his cheeks flushed--but with satisfaction, rather than embarrassment. "What was that, Doctor?"

"You're...but, you're..." the Doctor struggled. Finally, he gasped out, "How old _are_ you, Adric?"

"Eighteen," replied Adric promptly. "Is that relevant?"

The Doctor's eyes bugged. " _Eighteen_? Impossible! I'd have said twelve!"

Adric's calm expression dipped into a bit of a pout. "I'd like to see how old _you'd_ look in _these_ , Doctor," he pointed out, gesturing at his pajama-like attire.

"Fair point," the Doctor granted, trying very hard _not_ to think how old he probably _would_ look in _those_. "And you, Nyssa?"

"I'm eighteen as well, in Earth years," she answered, buttoning the top buttons of her jacket.

"Oh my," the Doctor whispered, half to himself. "And you both have fundamentally human biologies. With fundamentally human hormone patterns. Oh, no. No, no, no. I..." He glanced back at the pair on the sofa, sitting at a distance which would have seemed so very normal to him yesterday, and which now made him want to cry. " _No_."

"Doctor," said Nyssa, in her gentle way, "are we to understand that you have some objection to Adric and I engaging in more intimate relations?"

The sound of that word 'intimate,' so casually spoken, hit the Doctor like a hammer to the gut--a sensation with which he was, unfortunately, quite as familiar as he ever hoped to be. He was not entirely surprised to find himself holding conversation from a rather lower vantage point, as he sat down suddenly on a not-at-all-comfortable bit of floor.

"I just...this...oh, I most _certainly_ did not bargain for..." He shook his head, and began again. "Adric, I thought I'd been teaching you better! That...what I just saw...well, it's just not gentlemanly, you know."

"What isn't?" Adric asked, sounding genuinely curious.

"To...to... _take advantage_ of a lady that way."

"I don't see what you..."

"Excuse me, Doctor," interrupted Nyssa, "but I don't feel in the least 'taken advantage of.' I don't see why you should think I wasn't enjoying that just as much as Adric."

The Doctor stared at her. "Nyssa, wasn't Traken a very traditional sort of planet? Conservative? Concerned with decorum and seemliness, that sort of thing? I mean, I seem to recall..."

"Yes, Doctor, it was, but Traken is gone now. And I've been talking with Tegan about empowerment and independence, and reading some books left behind by the woman who used to have my bedroom--I think her name was Sarah?"

The Doctor groaned, burying his head in his hands. "I might have known," he muttered. For a moment, the thought of what effect Sarah Jane's sorts of books might have on a young girl of Nyssa's upbringing distracted him from the point at hand. Rallying, he continued, "Forgive me for making assumptions, Nyssa. And so the two of you are...are..."

"I think term Tegan used was 'an item,'" supplied Adric helpfully.

"Yes," said the Doctor, weakly. "Right. An...item." He swallowed hard. "And you're a pair of teenaged orphans. Under my care. And you're...you were...well, it seemed like...and that sort of thing would inevitably lead to...and so I ought to..." He swallowed again. "I ought to have a talk with you both about..." The Doctor blinked hard three times, clenched his hands violently on the knees of his stripey trousers, and then sprang from the floor with alarming speed. "Just remembered, very important thing, universe at stake, must dash!"

The two young people on the sofa watched the Doctor haring away through the door as though all the Daleks on Skaro were on his tail. Then Adric rolled his eyes, Nyssa shrugged, and they returned to more interesting pursuits.

*

"My dear Doctor..." the Master's leering was promptly cut off when the Doctor's hand closed around his arm, dragging him inside the Doctor's TARDIS.

"This," said the Doctor, as he released the Master, stalked over to the console, and levered the doors closed, "is _all your fault_. Perhaps it _is_ only a little thing..."

"Ah. I know this mood. I could ask _what_ is meant to be my fault, but there's no chance of stopping you now. You'll ramble until you've run your course. By all means, Doctor, proceed." The Master calmly submitted to being seized once more, this time by the wrist, and tugged towards the heart of the TARDIS.

"...compared to destroying a third of the universe, or assassinating the president, or letting me fall to my death, or any of those frankly _silly_ invasion plots you were so fond of body before last, but really, a man can only _take_ so much. I mean, these sorts of goings-on on my very own ship! I didn't bargain for this, you know. And it really is _entirely_ your fault. Adric was a stowaway--it isn't _my_ fault he's here--and if it weren't for you, Nyssa would have her real father around to do these things. _And_ a stepmother, for that matter! I have _not_ been going around fathering young Trakenites in my spare time, is what I mean to say, and this body you're living in has, and so I think it's only fair that _you_ should be the one to..."

"Doctor, is there _any_ chance I might persuade you to..."

"...and you just stand there, in your velvet, cool as the ice moon of Throom, just as though there weren't...and _oh_." The Doctor ground to a sudden halt, and the Master, unable to adjust in time, ran smack into him. "And if I get this _wrong_ , just imagine! Diapers and wailing in the night and spit-up on my trainers, and then--and then!--in just eighteen years and nine months more, I could be going through this _all over again_. Oh no. No, no, _no_. I will _not_. So _you_ ," the Doctor glared at the Master as fiercely as this face could manage (which wasn't nearly so fiercely as he might have hoped), "will just have to get this right, won't you? Now there, get in with you." Opening the door of the laboratory, which their wanderings had finally reached, the Doctor shoved the Master inside. His first instinct thereafter was to bolt, but the sound of Nyssa's gasp and Adric's high-pitched shriek as they realized the identity of their visitor recalled to him abruptly that he _might_ not have entirely thought this through. The Doctor slipped hastily into the laboratory.

"It's all right! He's here as a friend!"

"A _friend_? Doctor, this is the man who _killed my father_."

"And kidnapped me!"

"Ah. Yes. Well, about that...well. Bygones, and whatnot. I'm sure he's very sorry. Aren't you sorry, Master?" _This_ glare was of anything but dubious fierceness. It said only too clearly that the Doctor wished the Master the best of luck in acquiring that new set of regenerations he'd been lusting after, so that the Doctor could personally disembowel every one of his thirteen new selves.

For a moment, the Master actually blanched. Then he pulled himself back to his usual composure, and made an attempt at his usual smirk. "Deeply, deeply sorry. Tremendously repentant. It eats me up inside."

"So, there you have it. 'Forgive us our trespasses,' and so on. The Master is here at my invitation. He's going to have a little discussion with the both of you." The Doctor nudged the Master forward. "I'll just wait outside, shall I?"

"Doctor," said the Master, with a look of tenderly impatient scorn, "it would help if I had _any_ idea what _sort_ of talk I'm supposed to be having?"

The Doctor inclined his eyebrows frantically towards the pair on the sofa, his eyes darting back and forth from the Master's to Adric's arm around Nyssa's waist. The Master responded with an expression of blank disdain, at first, and then his eyes widened as he finally understood what the Doctor was about. "No!"

"Yes!" insisted the Doctor.

"No!" cried the Master, aghast. "Doctor, I am _not_ going to sit here and lecture your human pets about..."

"We're not human!" chirped Adric, and Nyssa continued with, "And, Doctor, neither you nor the Master needs to..."

"How could you do such a thing, Doctor? You, with your incessant moral posturing, to attempt to send an old friend into such appalling peril in his stead!"

"Oh, and I suppose _you_ would have stepped up and faced it like a Time Lord, if you'd been in my shoes!"

" _I_ am not the one who insists upon traveling the universe with a motley collection of adolescents trailing after him like ducklings."

"As I told you, I...wait, hang on a tick. How would you possibly know about ducklings, Master? There are no ducks on Gallifrey."

"I spent quite a bit of time on Earth some years ago, as you may recall. I used to feed a family of mallards through the window of my cell in that UNIT prison of yours. Rather friendly little things, ducks."

There was a mutual silence as both Time Lords contemplated the manifold virtues of ducks. "Doctor," Adric began.

"Right!" said the Doctor, snapping back to the present. "My point, Master..."

"I absolutely refuse, Doctor."

"But _Master_..."

"Good Lord," said Tegan loudly, wandering into the room, "just how useless _are_ you two, anyway?"

Both Time Lords shut their mouths with nearly-audible clacks.

"I was in the swimming pool," Tegan continued, "when the TARDIS popped up a sort of viewscreen to this room. Seems she thought I was the only one that could sort out all of your messes, and I can't say I blame her. Watch closely, Doctor. This is how it's done."

Tegan turned to the pair on the sofa. "Nyssa, don't do anything stupid. Adric, don't do anything stupider than you can help. If you hurt her, I'll beat you within an inch of your life. Condoms and lube are in the medicine cabinet of the onyx bathroom, a historical collection of illustrated Kama Sutras are filed under 'K' in the library, the Doctor's cricket bat is propped on the wall just outside his bedroom, and the room with the vibrating bed is marked with a lipstick kiss on the door. Anything else you'd like to know?"

"In the wardrobe..." Nyssa asked.

"Lingerie from a wide variety of eras and worlds, lowest level, to your left."

"Thanks Tegan," said Adric.

"Don't mention it," replied Tegan. Turning, she faced the two Time Lords again, and delivered a sharp, ringing slap to the Master's right cheek. " _That_ was for my aunt, you evil bastard." This was followed by an only slightly gentler smack upside the Doctor's head. "And _that_ was for being such an idiot. Weren't you ever a teenager yourself?"

"It was a very long time ago," the Doctor protested, rubbing his sore head. "And _I_ wasn't ever _nearly_ so much trouble."

The Master snorted. "Losing your memory in your old age, are you, Doctor?"

"Hush, you," the Doctor muttered, elbowing his best enemy in the ribs. "You act as though _you_ were so much better. The stories I could tell..."

Nyssa shot Tegan an appealing look, and the older girl, smiling in response, grabbed the Doctor and the Master and dragged them out the door. "Come on, you. Leave the poor things be. You've done enough damage for one afternoon."

The Doctor's fading voice continued to drift down the corridor and into the lab. "At least neither of us was nearly so rubbish today as Borusa when _he_ was the one giving _us_ this little lecture. If I recall correctly, he actually began with the words 'When two Time Lords love each other very much...'"


End file.
